IMO Final four will determine if he goes 1st pick or not. If Real didn’t advance to FF, I’m 100% positive Luka wouldn’t go as 1st pick. Just like with Ayton and NCAA "playoffs" where opposing coach tried to exploit his weakness, the same has been tried by Panathinaikos. The difference is, if you lose the game in NCAA, you can’t get a chance to redeem yourself. Doncic luckily had that chance. Vives, Panathinaikos coach, assigned Greek Freek’s brother to guard Doncic. The result? To say Luka had an underwhelming first two games would be an understatement. It was nice to see he is doing everything he can to get rid of Thanasis for even a few seconds to get a breather, but it was in vain: if there was anyone left prior to the game who didn’t believe you can stop Doncic by sticking a tall athletic guy on him, they had to acknowledge the truth. To be fair: since Doncic was the only creator left for that particular game, it made sense to focus defenses on him. He didn’t respond well at first, but with each game passing, he was getting more and more comfortable. During fourth game, you could see Luka solved the defense and as if that wasn’t enough, Lull shook off his rust from coming back in previous game and gave enough space to his young taemmate to shine again and lead his team in scoring for that game (17 points on 9 shots with 5 assists and 4 rebounds against only 1 turnover). Yesterday, he got a triple double in just 22 minutes! After 2 missed games because of foot injury, he got 17 points without a missed shot (3/3 for 3, 6/6 on FTs and 1/1 for 2), 10 rebounds, 10 assists and 1 steal.
Full highlights from yesterday's game: I see Doncic has a few doubters here, but especially in the media (athleticism and defense). But how many college players this year, or in any year for that matter, can play like this? Btw, this is first triple double in Spain after 11 years. There have been only 7 triple doubles in Spain's league's history.
It's really hard to say since they haven't even tried to play professionally, but one thing's for sure - Doncic would absolutely dominate the NCAA competition.
In the last game before Final four match against CSKA, that happened exactly one week ago, Doncic tweaked his ankle during first half. He reentered the game in 2nd half, but it was obvious the ankle is bothering him. I hope this won't be a factor on Friday in his biggest club match to date!
Luka just won the Euroleague with Real Madrid. He also won Euroleague MVP . And he also won Final Four MVP. At. 19. Freaking. Years. And Ayton will be 1st pick...absolutely baffling. Doncic is playing against former NBA players. Some of them had mediocre-to-decent career here (Thomas Robinson, Alexey Shved, Nando de Colo, Rudy Fernandez, Jan Vesely...), but are grown men. And he outplayed them ALL. I'm reading Suns' and Kings' page a bit every day, and Kings are STOKED about Doncic, while lots of Suns fans can't list all Luka's flaws every day fast enough. What a joke.
Doncic should be the number one pick in my opinion, BUT... I can understand the arguments for picking Ayton. NBA scouts don't look at the current production level as much as the overall ceiling of the prospect. And Ayton's ceiling is very very high, probably higher than Luka's. But I still think there's a 90% chance Luka will end up as a more impactful player than Ayton.
You don't have to play great D or be freakishly athletic/quick to be a superstar in this era. Plenty of examples. A lot will depend on Luka's 3-point shot though.
Yea but his biggest weaknesses are his lateral quickness and his overall ability to play defense because of his lack of speed. If he’s that slow against EuroLeague talent then the NBA is going to exploit it much more. Even NBA players that are “bad” defensively could be all world defense in Euroleagues. The talent level is that far apart. It’s a different ball game. I just think his weaknesses can easily keep him off the floor until he gets it fixed.
It really depends why that said player is a bad defender. Is it the physical tools, or the awareness/IQ? European defensive schemes/systems are more sophisticated and require a higher basketball IQ, whereas in the NBA you need a much better athleticism/length to be an impactful defender. I think as long as Luka has good awareness and basketball IQ (which scouts indicate that he does), he should be fine. He won't be a lock-down defender, but with the help of his teammates, he can be hidden on that end.
Not trying to make a case for the kid, but I'm sure that's what they said about James Harden after being drafted top 5 by OKC....
My man @omgTHEpotential defending my countryman! Where Dragić and Lowry divide us, Dončić brings us back together haha
So is Harden, and he's Top 5 player in NBA... Green certainly felt that way too, until he got posterized by The Beard.
Haha. I think I'm being objective in regards to Doncic. He might not have the elite athleticism, but he's no Steve Novak. Luka's athleticism is probably average for an NBA player. And while not having elite athleticism (like LeBron or Westbrook) will somewhat limit his ceiling, he can still become a top10 NBA player even with an average athleticism, as was proved by many NBA players before him. Heck, Larry Bird was a far worse athlete and defender than Doncic.
Doncic is much better than Lonzo so the joke will be on the stupid teams that let him slip out of top 3.
